


contact high

by ohtempora



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Bodyswap, Embedded Images, Lingerie, M/M, Mutual Masturbation, Recreational Drug Use, Roommates, the spirit of voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-09-01 05:11:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 19,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16758574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohtempora/pseuds/ohtempora
Summary: Chris thinks about his hands a lot, in the context of fielding, in the context of his swing. After spending an offseason overhauling his mechanics, he's pretty damn familiar with how his hands are supposed to look.Those aren't his hands.





	1. contact high

**Author's Note:**

> this is literally the dumbest thing i've ever written and it's several thousand words longer than my undergraduate thesis. also, fangraphs doesn't deserve to be used like this and i'm sorry, please don't let them know but maybe become a member of their wonderful site.
> 
> thank you to engine, addandsubtract, and ewidentnie for the help + WILDLY helpful beta work, esp addandsubtract for doing this so quickly, and ewidentnie again for making!!! the faux-articles via css wizardry as well as going over this fic like three times. you're all fab and i truly appreciate it.
> 
> while i generally try and line my fics up with the real schedule, i just. couldn't. with this. so it's more or less in july, and they more or less play the mentioned teams, but it shouldn't jolt you out of the story - i hewed close to the actual record. chris taylor struck out a bunch this season (it happens) but afaik, not because he freaky friday'd with his roommate.

**approximately ten days earlier**

Chris wakes up from a nap in Cody’s bed.

All things considered, waking up in Cody’s bed isn’t entirely abnormal. He’s passed out here before. Usually it’s after a night out and Cody is lying next to him, snoring with an arm thrown over his face. Usually it isn’t because his gametime alarm is blaring. Usually Cody's mattress makes his back hurt.

His back doesn’t hurt right now, which is the first sign. He went to nap in his own bed. Cody’s nowhere to be found. The heaviness of his limbs is different, the weight of his head, the chill on his face — his beard is missing, when he brushes his hand over his chin.

“Cody,” Chris says haltingly. “Are you there?” and even the timbre of his voice sounds different, lower, vowels strung out.

No one responds. Chris sits up. They have to play a game tonight, they’ve both got to get up. He stretches his arms above his head — his shoulders shift, unsettlingly — this isn’t _right_.

From the other end of the apartment, a scream.

“Cody?” Chris asks. “You okay, man?”

“ _CHRIS_. DUDE.”

“I’m here, I’m in your bedroom — I dunno why I’m here, did we sleepwalk, or—”

“Come here right the fuck now,” Cody says, more urgent than he’s ever sounded before, even during Game 7 of the World Series. Chris pushes the sheets down from where they’re tangled around his waist, tries to get out of bed, and overbalances, falling flat on his face.

"Ow," he says, and tries to push himself up off the ground.

Those aren't his hands.

He blinks, looks again. Those aren't his hands. They're longer, and the fingers are bonier. Chris thinks about his hands a lot, in the context of fielding, in the context of his swing. After spending an offseason overhauling his mechanics, he's pretty damn familiar with how his hands are supposed to look.

"Fuck it, I'm coming to you," Cody says, and with the high-pitched terror half-gone, Chris can tell that's not Cody’s voice. He gets himself up to sitting, reaches for the phone on the nightstand. It unlocks with his thumbprint, but the background photo isn't him and his sister, it's Cody mid-swing, one of the photos the Dodgers put on Twitter as a wallpaper. He smiles down at it reflexively — vain asshole — but he shouldn't be able to unlock Cody's phone with his thumbprint.

It doesn't fully sink in until he sees his reflection in the screen and it's Cody's face staring back at him, mouth open in shock.

"What," Chris says. "What. The fuck. What."

He thumbs over to the camera and switches it to front-facing. That's. Cody's face. There's no way around the fact that it's Cody's face, and Cody's long hands, and Cody's long limbs tripping him up.

"Chris?"

"I'm on the floor," Chris calls back. Cody sounds like he's getting closer, and sure enough, he skids through the doorway, in — well, that's Chris's damn body, isn't it.

"Jesus christ, dude," Cody says. "I'm not high, right? This isn't a prank?" He reaches a hand — Chris's hand — out, and Chris takes it, levering himself up to standing. He's looking down at himself, but that makes sense. Cody has three inches on him.

"You're too tall," he says.

Cody sniffs. "You're too short."

"I'm a normal height." Chris looks down at the body he’s apparently inhabiting. He can’t think of it as _his_. "Your legs are too long. What the fuck."

"I can't believe this isn't a prank," Cody says. He presses his hands against his face. "Oh my god, your beard. Oh my god. Your beard is on my face."

"Don't fuck with my beard." Chris squints at him. He's never seen his face from this angle before. Mirrors are reversed, and photographs flatten you out. "That's what I look like? For real?"

"Yeah, man," Cody says. He's rubbing the beard again. "I gotta look at you every damn day, that's what I see."

"Jesus." Chris wants to sit down, maybe put his head between his knees and hyperventilate a bit. He thinks he's allowed. But Cody's body is all gawky limbs and he's not convinced he won't fall over, or somehow smack himself in the face.

Everything is so odd, the easy comfort of 28 years in the same body totally gone. It's like when he was 14 all over again. He'd grown four inches in as many months, had to readjust to moving the right way, pain radiating out from his hips through his core. He'd thought he was done with not knowing how to move over solid ground.

"I think I should be freaking out more." Cody looks up at him, big-eyed. He's biting at Chris's lip the same way he chews his own lip, and it's so alien, seeing Cody's tics and expressions move over Chris's face. "This is some Freaky Friday shit and it isn't even Friday."

"Weren't they like, cursed in that movie?" Chris hasn't seen it since middle school. "Lindsay Lohan and her mom were cursed, because they didn't understand each other, some shit like that. We haven't fought or anything recently."

"Nope."

They're both pretty chill as roommates. Not a lot bothers Cody, who tends to let things slide off his back. What’s more, Chris likes living with him. They've gotten along since the spring training after he was traded from Seattle, made fast friends living together in a team-owned apartment in Oklahoma City, kept it up when they were called up within days of each other. It isn’t always like this. Back at UVA, Chris lived in the baseball house, got more or less sick of it by the time he was drafted. Looking back it was great, but at the time, everything smelled like feet and no one in the house cared enough to clean.

He hasn't gotten sick of Cody yet, and he doesn't think he's going to. If anything, he’s worried he likes Cody too much, knows he's tipping past friendship to feelings he shouldn't have for any teammate, let alone his roommate.

"I forgot to empty the dishwasher yesterday," Cody says, face creased with worry. "Maybe that?"

"I legit didn't even notice." Of all the things you could be mad at someone for. "I'm as stumped as you, man."

"This is so fucking weird." Cody looks down at himself. Chris has catalogued the differences between the two of them before: he's broader, Cody's straight up skinny; Cody's taller by far; they’ve got different face shapes; he knows his Virginia accent comes out occasionally and his voice is higher, whereas Cody speaks with a West Coast inflection and stoner-boy drawl. "Just walking over here was fucked up, I walked into like two walls."

"I fell out of the bed." Chris looks down too, at Cody's — his — bare feet. "How have I never noticed how gross your feet are before, man? Your toes are hairy as shit."

Cody glares at him. "Is this the time."

"Probably not," Chris admits, scrunching his toes. "Sorry."

Slumping back against the bedroom wall, Cody groans. "Fuck, man," he says. "The game."

" _Shit_."

It's almost two, right when they normally head to Dodger Stadium. Every game is important after the slump to start the season. They’re digging themselves out but it’s slow, steady work, gaining a game here, losing one there. "Are we gonna play tonight?"

"I don't know about you, but I'm really looking forward to staring Roberts in the eye and telling him we switched bodies." Cody crosses his arms. The slouch in him — that's not Chris, that's all him. God, keeping track is making his head hurt. "Didja know what position you were playing tonight? I'm pretty sure Max is at first."

"Might be short." Chris winces. "If you're in the outfield—"

"Yeah, you're probably fine, but—"

"Do you think there's like, muscle memory?" Chris asks desperately. "I was a shortstop my entire life, basically full-time until I hit the majors, so maybe you'll know how."

"I think it'd be overruled by my brain," Cody says. "I don't know how this works. I think even playing my normal position would be a fucking minefield." He moans. "We're going to make so many errors in the field tonight. It's going to be so bad."

"There goes the Gold Glove." Chris laughs humorlessly. None of this is funny: not the baseball part of it, not physically, not emotionally, how hard it’s going to be to pretend. "I guess we, uh. Maybe there'll be a double switch."

"I'm gonna hope so." Cody's slowly sliding down the wall to the floor. "Also, like. I don't think I can drive like this?"

"No," Chris says. "I don't want to even risk it in LA traffic with your freakish legs."

"They're not _that long_."

"We'll Uber."

"Alright." Cody turns. "I'm going to get your shit together for the game, I guess. Uh — I have to pee, so, uh—"

"It's just my dick," Chris says. "You've seen it before?"

Cody glares at him again. His glare on Chris's face remains flat-out disconcerting. "I'm asking, bro, I don't wanna make this weirder than it already is."

"Go and piss," Chris says. If he thinks about it too much it'll be fucked up, distracting. He can't think about Cody touching him that way, but if he doesn't let himself consider it then it'll fine. "As long as you don't, like, shave weird shapes into my pubes or fuck with my beard, I don't care."

"Alright," Cody says again, and leaves.

Immediately, Chris sits back down on the bed, levering himself carefully down so his legs don't give out on him. He's in Cody's body. Cody's in his. They're going to have to play an entire game of baseball tonight, against the Padres, who, despite their record, are very much a major league team. Of everyone on the team, he guesses he'd pick swapping with Cody, if he had to choose, but that's cold comfort at the barest minimum. Their familiarity is a blessing and a curse. It’s already hard to distract himself from Cody and now he’s going to think about him every waking hour of the day.

They're so, so fucked.

He stands and makes his way over to Cody's dresser. Can't wear shorts and a tank top to the game. He strips the shirt off and tosses it in the direction of the overflowing hamper, pulling a nice polo out of the middle drawer. Cody wears his shirts tighter than Chris normally does and he shifts around, trying to get it to sit right on his shoulders before he gives up and grabs jeans, stepping out of Cody's shorts.

Okay, he — probably should have noticed this before, the mild discomfort, lace scratching against his abdomen, fuck, the lace covering his _dick_. But everything else was off, inhabiting Cody's body, his entire system shocked; nothing registered until now.

Chris looks down again. He’s wearing a thong, he's positive, it's basically wedged up his ass. Blue lace, something he's pretty sure he's seen on a billboard outside Victoria's Secret, except Cody was wearing it under a pair of OKC Dodgers athletic shorts for his pregame nap. The underwear barely covers anything.

They've had a horrific start, and Cody's bat isn't hot. The thong is more or less Dodger blue. Chris remembers reading about Giambi and his gold lamé thong back in high school, the article getting passed around his high school baseball team. His team all said they wouldn't do that unless it got real bad, but wow, wearing a thong, MLB players were legit in their efforts to slump bust. His high school baseball team was pretty successful, and it thankfully never came down to superstition

Guys in college had weird superstitions too. It's probably just — everyone does all they can for the team, in strange, small ways. Always putting on your left cleat first, or using the same glove for years and years, or wearing the same cup even though it reeks: Chris has seen a lot over 20-plus years playing baseball. He steps gingerly out of the thong.

He told Cody not to be weird about seeing his dick, so he's gonna take his own advice and not be weird about this. Grab regular underwear and put on jeans, and not think about it, because he has to play baseball in this body in four hours and he hasn't entirely figured out the best way to not lurch around or hit himself in the face with one of Cody's fucking spider arms.

"Dude, you ready to call the Uber?" Cody hollers from down the hall.

Chris is ready enough. "Yeah, coming." Cody must have forgotten what he had on. Either way Chris won't mention it. Neither of them need to get any more worked up when they're going to have to face the team — fuck, the team.

He calls the Uber from Cody's account when they’re standing by the door, then stuffs his feet into sneakers and grabs his bag by default. "Wait," Cody says. He's holding his own bag. "We should switch these. Unless we want to have to explain. And I don't."

"Oh. Yeah." Chris hands over his backpack. "Uh, phones?"

"I'm not going anywhere, if your mom calls or whatever you can tell me what to say." Cody shrugs. "Unless you have any super embarrassing shit?"

"Nah." Dating app profiles, but that's it. His text thread with his sister, maybe, but even that should be okay. Cody's watching him closely, and Chris realizes he must be looking for a sign, if Chris will bring up what he was wearing. "We can figure that out after the game." That's the most important thing right now for both of them, making it through the next eight hours. "Okay."

"Okay," Cody agrees, and punches him in the shoulder before they go out to the cab.

-

Chris spends the ride to the stadium watching Cody, which — he knows it’s weird, whatever, it’s probably the fifth-weirdest thing about today. He's staring at his own face, and he entertains himself doing so for a while. Cody has his head tipped back, his eyes closed. He's breathing shallowly, in and out.

So they've switched bodies. That's fine. He could have switched with one of the pitchers, and he hasn’t pitched since high school. He'd probably end up making the poor guy get Tommy John with how fucked his mechanics would be. At least he and Cody already live together. The team can probably be smokescreened for a while, they can hang out together in the locker room and blow the guys off for a couple days. Baseball isn't a game of two players, their teammates can be trusted to cover for the inevitable bad games they're both going to have.

He massages his temples. Cody's skin is rougher to the touch, under calloused fingertips. If they don't wake up tomorrow back in their own bodies they're going to have to sit down and teach each other all the tiny learned movements they take for granted. After the game they can eat and watch a movie and not deal with it further. He guesses he'll sleep in Cody's room.

Being Cody. Jesus Christ, Chris thinks again, a little maniacally. Sometimes he thinks about what it’d be like to kiss him, and right now he’s looking at Cody behind his own face. He laughs, can’t do anything else.

Cody's eyes pop open. "Dude."

"We aren't there yet," Chris says. They're two miles away from the stadium and mired in traffic. "You can go back to sleep."

"No, I like, realized." Cody holds his hands up. "You bat righty."

"Yeah, so?"

"I bat left."

"Oh. _Oh,_ shit."

"I know like — bodies and muscle memory and whatever, but — it's my brain, man? I've been using my left hand? It feels kinda weird but not as weird as like, walking while short, so."

"Literally over six feet," Chris says. "God, fuck, I didn't even think about that." He looks down at Cody's hands, making an experimental fist. "You're gonna take BP, right?"

"Yeah, 'course."

"So I guess we, uh. Try it out then and see what happens. Batting."

Cody groans. "We're both getting benched tonight and you fuckin' know it."

Chris can't disagree. "I hope not," he says. This season is so much more precarious than the last one ever was. They aren't 16 and 26 anymore, they've crawled back above .500, but he's not taking any of it for granted. He's striking out more, Cody has a cold bat — nothing comes easy.

The Uber driver glances at them, then looks back ahead at the road, inching forward a couple more feet.

"I hope we win," Cody says morosely, and closes his eyes again.

Chris looks back down at Cody's hands. There's a cut across the knuckles, mostly healed. Calluses in places where Chris's hands are soft. He tries wrapping his hands around an imaginary bat, lefty like Cody would. It feels wrong.

He sighs and opens Cody’s phone with his thumbprint, figures he’ll check other scores from around the league. Dicking around At Bat kills five minutes of traffic, but the divisional standings are depressing. He opens Cody’s albums, thinking about setting something dumb as his lock screen, though it’ll be hard to surpass a photo of Cody himself.

There isn’t anything, though he finds a photo from the last time the two of them were drunk and sets it as wallpaper for posterity. Checks in Cody’s favorites, but there isn’t anything good, all standard, except. There’s one photo, towards the back, a regular dick pic but Cody’s dick is covered in maroon fabric edged with white lace.

Chris bites his lip against the shock. That’s deliberate. Taking a dick pic in that pose isn’t superstition. That’s Cody in lace panties. He scrolls right and there’s another one, full body, Cody’s thumb hooked in his waistband, pouting into the mirror. Come-hither, like he’s asking for someone, anyone — but not Chris — to come and get it. It makes Chris’s stomach jump.

He closes the app and slides the phone into his pocket, thinks as hard as he can about his swing.

-

The game is kind of a shitshow. They manage to do okay in the clubhouse beforehand. Puig gives them both suspicious looks, and Chase does too, but Chris plays off the concern by yawning hugely. "I'm tired," he says.

"You forget to eat ice cream before the game?" Justin asks.

"Not as much as I should have," Chris tells him, and then turns around and goes to his own locker by accident. He saves himself at the last minute, veering leftward to make it safely to Cody's.

They grab food together pregame too. Rich, making the start and clearly sensing both of them have decided to shut the fuck up today, sits near them with his headphones on, locked into his own crazy pitcher zone. Chris is glad for that. It means Justin doesn't come by to chat with Cody and come away suspicious when Chris can't fake it. He does duck Kemp wanting to talk about restaurants, smiles through the teasing Kemp gives him in return.

Roberts announces the starting lineup: Rich on the mound, Yas behind the plate, Chris at short, Cody in center.

When Corey went down with his elbow injury, it obviously sucked balls for the team, but Chris has never wished more that the surgery could have waited a month or two.

"Short?" Cody looks panicked. He inches closer to Chris, voice pitched low. "I can't, man."

"Tell Roberts you're sick?" Chris says. He doesn't have a fucking clue what to do. He can handle center field, even if he won't be great at it when he still can't entirely handle his own limbs. Cody's taller body should help him out with range, at least, even if he trips and ends up plastered across Twitter.

Being a viral GIF wouldn’t even be top five on the list of shit that’s happened to him today.

"At this point I don't know." Cody's straight up gnawing at his lip, and Chris bites back the urge to slap his hand away. Cody won’t be the one dealing with chapped lips later. "I guess after the first inning I could make myself throw up?"

"Do you even know how?"

"What, how to stick my hand down my throat?" Cody winces. "Technically, yeah."

"I don't— you do that and they'll send you to the trainers."

"Don't wanna go there. If they see anything, I don’t want to have to try and explain."

"No," Chris agrees. "So let's just— you have the reference card, right? For positioning?" He's got his in the back pocket of Cody's baseball pants. They've been shifted around the diamond enough with Corey's injury, and JT, that no one will look at them twice for having the cards.

"Yeah." Cody taps his thigh. "I'm also like, what if I overthrow, or fuck up your arm?"

"You won't," Chris says, with more confidence than he feels. "Just— it's a baseball game, right? A regular season baseball game. You ever play with the flu?"

"Sure."

"So imagine it's like that. You have the flu. That's why you feel off. Not because you're me or anything. You have the flu." He's desperate, he doesn't know if it's working, but Cody's stopped looking like he wants to hurl into the nearest Gatorade cooler, at least.

"Fuck, what about BP though."

"That's okay. We both gotta practice hitting, right? Me lefty, you righty."

"Chris—"

Chris reaches out and squeezes his knee. He wonders what they look like. Everyone would see Cody comforting him, if they looked over. They wouldn't know. "That's just practice, man. We do it all the time."

"Okay." Cody grabs a water bottle and squirts some into his mouth. "You're right. One step at a time. Fuck up batting practice before fucking up on the field."

"That's the spirit," Chris says. "We're getting really drunk tonight no matter if we win or lose, by the way."

"Oh good." Cody swallows down some more water. "I was hoping you'd say that."

Chris squeezes his knee again and then stands. "Come on," he says. "Let's go make asses of ourselves in front of the entire damn team."

So yeah, the game is kind of a shitshow. Batting practice is pretty bad. Chris has to mentally correct himself over and over again, fiddling with the placement of his hands, stepping in and out of the box. Cody's batting stance is far more upright than his, and he closes his eyes and tries to remember the shape of it exactly, the precise angles and contortions, forces himself into what he's sure is a pale approximation of the real thing. At least they’re in the cages, not out on the field where there are press and cameras, more people to question what the fuck is going on.

Top of the inning, Rich gets two Ks and a groundout to first, nothing doing for either him or Cody, thank god. First time up to bat he strikes out swinging on four pitches, and the only reason it isn’t three is because it’s a ball so far inside he feels it whiz by his ribs. Cody does the same with a man on first, his swing awkward and jolting, body caught in a lurch; Chris knows it’s because he’s fighting what his brain is telling him, muscle memory confused. He almost trips coming out of the batter’s box.

“Belli,” Roberts says, and Chris starts, before realizing Dave’s talking to him. Not Cody. Right. “He do anything to himself on the way over? You guys drove in together, right?”

“Uh, we took a cab,” Chris says. Nothing he says now will reflect well once they switch back. If they switch back. He’s gotta be careful. “We—” it’s such a fucking copout, but he doesn’t care if the staff thinks they’re hungover right now. “Both woke up a little under the weather. Not, you know, real bad or anything, but—”

“Mmmm.” Dave’s watching Cody come back to the dugout. “Alright then.”

They’re absolutely both getting pinch hit for unless something magical happens in the next half inning. Chris can feel it in his bones.

-

“What the hell was that?” Justin doesn’t look mad at him, more confused. “You wake up on the wrong side of the bed, Belli?”

“Ah,” Chris says. “Haha. Something like that. Yes.”

Across the locker room he can see Chase has Cody cornered. At least Chris has a quieter rep in the clubhouse; Cody’s getting away with nodding along to Chase’s no doubt intense, well-meaning encouragement. Lucky man.

“You want some ice cream? I think the cooler has some of those cheesecake bars left.” Justin pats him on the shoulder. “I don’t mind getting it for you.”

“Uh—” Chris doesn’t really want ice cream. He wants to go home and lie on his bed and try and work through the mechanics of his swing in his head, figure out if there’s any way he can meld his approach and Cody’s in Cody’s body, maybe watch some video. Failing that, he wants to watch action movies and drink on the couch while Cody pokes him with his feet every time he wants popcorn. “Sure, I guess. Thanks.”

Justin looks concerned, even as he’s fetching Chris dessert. That’s absolutely the worst part.

“We’re getting real dinner, you want to join? You can get CT to come too if he wants.”

“No, it’s okay.” Chris shrugs. He isn’t used to shrugging in Cody’s body yet. The roll of his shoulder muscles is totally different. “I think we’re going to go home and order in.”

“Alright.” Justin claps him on the shoulder again. “Invite’s open if you change your mind.”

“Thanks, dude,” Chris says. He’s reasonably confident, after way too much time listening to Cody talk about whatever pops into his head, that Cody would throw in the word dude there.

At least it gets Justin to go away.

Cody manages to extricate himself from Chase soon after. Roberts isn’t looking for them, nor is Ward, so it looks like Chris’s lie held and everything is being chalked up to a minor cold, maybe a hangover, and a bad game. That’s going to buy them 20 hours max, but it’s something.

“I want to go home,” Cody says. “And order a fuckton of food from the place around the corner and have a beer and pass the fuck out.”

“Sounds like a fucking plan,” Chris says, relieved, and calls an Uber a second later.

They don’t talk much on the ride home. Traffic’s backed up out of the stadium as always, and Chris stares at the lights on the 110 as they pass by, midnight-blue Los Angeles sky overhead. Cody’s vaguely brainstorming what he wants to eat, until the driver asks if they want the radio on, and then they both fall silent.

When they’re in their apartment and the door is closed and locked, Chris finally, finally exhales.

“Well,” he says.

“That happened.” Cody kicks his shoes off and pulls out his phone— his real one, not Chris’s. They swapped after the game, which was necessary. Chris can’t deal with the urge to look at the photo he found. Sooner or later, though, having the wrong phones will get noticed too. “I’m ordering pizza. And weed. I think the delivery guy’s still up and I’m all out.”

“You think smoking like this is a good idea?”

“Can’t make it worse.” Cody shrugs, fingers stumbling over his screen. He’s got a point: tomorrow’s a night game, and even though they definitely have to go in early to hit in the cages, they can sleep in. Getting high usually helps Chris feel grounded in his body, more in tune. Maybe it’ll ground him in Cody’s while he’s temporarily inhabiting it.

“Alright.” Chris goes to the fridge and grabs them each a beer, only bumping his hip once on the doorframe. 12 hours in, he’s gotten somewhat better at walking in Cody’s body, though he’s got a bruised-up lower half, and he’s sure Cody has the same. At least it’ll blend with their game bruises. Every catch he made in-game was awkward, each throw tinged with the knowledge he could seriously fuck up Cody’s elbow for the rest of the season.

The weed comes first, then the pizza. Cody pays for both in cash, lays the pizza out in the living room next to their beers and his pipe.

“Five bucks we wake up tomorrow and we’re fine,” he says, morose, then reaches out and packs the bowl.

“I’ll drink to that,” Chris says, and takes the pipe when it’s handed to him.

They get steadily high, passing the pipe back and forth, working their way through the entire pie. Usually getting high with Cody is more fun than this— they watch dumb movies, or try and play video games, or have a few more of the guys over and turn it into a real party. This is slow and methodical, until Chris is crossfaded, the pizza is gone, and he’s slumped on the floor.

“I feel good,” Cody says, somewhere above him, stretched out on the couch. “Wow, your body is like. My knees feel stoned. That’s wild.”

“They are not,” Chris says, and reaches up to swat at him. From the light ‘oof’, he thinks he gets Cody in the ribs. They’re his own ribs. He cares about the integrity of his ribs. He doesn’t hit too hard. “I’m fucked up. Your tolerance is for shit.”

“It’s the beer.”

“It’s light beer.”

“Whatever.”

They both fall silent. Chris closes his eyes and squeezes them shut until he sees stars. What a weird day. Being Cody in the clubhouse was— fine, he supposes. Cody gets treated like Justin’s little brother, like everyone’s little brother, in a way Chris doesn’t, but it wasn’t bad. He’s fond of Cody anyway, has been for months and months, and it’s good to know it’s reflected by the other guys on the team. 

If Chris was braver, or dumber, he’d ask about the underwear he woke up wearing. He’s high, but not that high. It’s probably a joke, the photo a joke too, unless Cody has more somewhere, and even then it’s just— a thing. People are allowed to have things, right? It’s a pretty harmless overall thing.

“Chris?”

“What's up?”

“Did you, like. When we first woke up. I was wearing, uh—”

So he doesn't have to ask. Cody’s bringing it up all on his own. “Not your boxers?”

“Right.” Some soft clicking sounds from above indicate Cody's taking another hit. Chris can't blame him. “You know how my bat hasn't been shit?”

“You're working on it,” Chris says, because Cody is, identifying where pitchers attack him, sitting down with the coaching staff and heat maps. “It's gonna come, man.”

“I hope.” Cody exhales. “Anyway, I know Giambi and Jeter, they had a thing during slumps, wore underwear like that, so I thought I'd try it it. Just. Just in case it isn't all my swing.”

“Hey, if it worked for Jeter,” Chris says. “I won't say anything to the guys.”

“Okay.” Cody sounds relieved. “Chris?”

“Yeah?”

“‘M glad I switched with you instead of like. Yasi. Because then he has the baby and I’d have to deal with having a baby. Or Strip or Woody or whoever. Don’t wanna pitch.”

“Like if you had to do it?”

“If I had to do it, yeah.”

Chris reaches blindly up again and pats Cody, this time on the stomach. “Thanks, man,” he says.

They lie there for a while longer, breathing together. Chris looks down his body, at the torso and legs and feet that aren’t his. Cody’s right. It could have been someone else. It’s pretty bad, but it could have been worse.

-

They head to bed eventually. It’s been a long, long day.

Chris wants to sleep in his own bed, in his room, but he remembers how his back hates Cody’s bed. “We should probably, you know,” he says. “Stay in each other’s rooms. I can’t sleep in your bed.”

“My mattress isn’t too soft,” Cody protests. He rubs his lower back. “You’re right, though. Don’t wanna mess anything else up and we gotta play tomorrow.”

“Ugh,” Chris says summarily, and goes to get ready for bed.

Falling asleep in Cody’s bed is easier said than done. He can’t stop going over the events of the day. Waking up in Cody’s body. Feeling more awkward holding a baseball bat than he has in a long time. What Cody had on under his sweats. The photo.

The photo— he knows Cody lied to him. Maybe it started out as a way to bust his slump, but maybe Cody likes it. How the thong looked.

Chris shifts, suddenly half-hard.

He won’t. He can’t. Thinking about Cody will only make everything harder, both when they wake up tomorrow and when they switch back. The past several months he’s done a good job, pushing down any emotion threatening to go beyond mere fondness, hiding behind the occasional dry joke and just — letting himself smile at Cody, be amused by him, enjoy spending time together, but not letting himself have anything more.

He’s not going to jerk off in Cody’s body either.

Eventually Chris drifts off, dreaming of unsettled things he can’t remember.

When he wakes up he hopes, for half a second, that he's back in his own body, that it was temporary, a strange 24 hour bug. But he’s exhausted despite the sleep and still in Cody’s bed, in Cody’s room, alone. Still in Cody’s body.

“Fuck this shit,” Chris says, and drags himself upright. It's an hour before he usually wakes up but there’s no way he falls back asleep. He showers, fast — he told Cody not to care about nudity and he’s trying not to as well but it’s hanging over showering, getting dressed, different from this angle than looking away in the lockers. Plus the urge to compare—

He looks down. Cody’s dick is longer than his, maybe a little thinner. Definitely pinker. He wraps his hand around it, almost unthinkingly, expects that to feel strange. It doesn’t, obviously, it’s a hand on the dick that, for all intents and purposes is right now his. He stiffens up and jerks his hand back, turns the water a few notches colder until he’s calmed down.

Finishing up, he goes to get dressed, puts together an outfit with a lot less care than normal. They’ll change at the stadium for BP anyway.

He pulls open Cody’s top drawer. Cody’s pretty fastidious about doing his own laundry, his ambivalence towards other chores aside. The underwear must be why. There’s a heap of cotton that looks like his boxers, and then in the back, neatly folded — more fabric, clearly not boxers or briefs or a stray pair of sliding shorts. Chris pulls some of it out: lace panties, and thin bras that look like the ones he’s seen on Instagram. There’s a lot, most of it Dodger blue, some of it in a shade of maroon he knows Cody likes and remembers from the photo, some black silk mixed in as well. Enough that it’s not an accident or superstition but a collection.

Chris slams the drawer shut, then opens it again, careful. He— didn't know. He wonders where Cody buys his lingerie, how he picks out what he likes. Online, maybe. A lot of the items look like they're expensive.

Sometimes Cody disappears into his room. Chris has never questioned it. They don’t have to hang out all the time. But maybe Cody's trying things on, dressing matching sets, looking at how he looks in the mirror, admiring the slight flare of his hips, taking those photos — Chris wonders if he sends them to anyone and swallows against the sudden, unexpected flare of jealousy. A girl he's met, or a hookup, or fuck, a teammate. It doesn’t matter. They aren't getting sent to him; he had no idea.

He’s told Cody a lot. Cody knows he fucks guys sometimes, knows how anxious he gets about his spot on the team, even after a playoff MVP and a 5 WAR season. Chris thought Cody told him a lot, too.

He closes the drawer.

-

The next game is not better.

They both hit in the cage beforehand, long enough that the coaches come down to check if everything’s okay. Ward’s looking with concerned eyes, calls Roberts in for backup when Chris says no, he’s not gonna stop yet, thanks.

“Don’t tire yourself out too much before the game,” Roberts says, a steadying hand on his shoulder. “One bad game, it’s not gonna change our plan for either of you.”

“Just, uh, y’know,” Chris says. Talking like Cody on purpose makes the words in his mouth feel like marbles. “Trying to work stuff out.”

This time Cody isn’t starting, the pitcher a lefty. Chris gets to watch from the bench, Cody looking slow and awkward at shortstop, still unable to make every routine play that Chris would pride himself on— fast-twitch muscles a second too slow, double-pumping throws he’d make smoothly from first. He gets pulled out as soon as the Cards go to their bullpen.

Chris gets put in left for an inning, hits for an inning, thanks to the double switch. He grounds out weakly to first, but at least it’s contact, albeit shitty contact. No balls are hit to him, thank god, Kiké taking over at short and doing a far more effective job fielding to turn a double play.

The team doesn’t need either of them playing poorly right now, not when it’s all hands on deck. They scrape out the win, more due to timely hitting from Max and Kemp more than anyone else. Chris is fully expecting more of a lecture from the coaching staff, at least video work, but it's only been two games. Every error he commits is amplified right now, wrong, every inefficient play magnified. He doesn’t know how to fix anything. Chris is used to baseball being hard work, used to not taking his spot in the majors for granted. If he gets complacent he’ll be replaced. He learned that lesson in Seattle when he was bouncing between Triple-A and the big leagues and it stuck. Right now he could go hit in the cages for hours and hours and everything would still be wrong.

When they filter back into the clubhouse the mood’s cheerful with the victory, music playing from someone’s speaking. Chris talks to the media as Cody, but only has to answer a few standard questions, the kind he can mumble through while faking Cody’s slow grin. The press goes away satisfied enough and he starts getting his stuff together.

After this series they have an off day. Chris needs it fucking desperately.

He’s absently chatting with Matt, not paying much attention, nodding along while Matt talks about sneakers. He grabs his bag and slings it over his shoulder, glancing around for Cody to see if he’s ready, and that’s when they slip up. 

“Hey, stupid,” Yasiel yells across the room, and Chris— he _knows_ this is his cue, that Yasiel calls Cody by his own nickname, he’s been doing so well, they’ve both been doing so well— “Belli, stupid, wait up.”

But it’s Cody in Chris’s body who turns around, who yells, “Yeah, idiot, what’s up?” and Yasiel doesn’t look surprised, only smug.

Chris looks around. No one’s paying them much attention, yet. “Um.”

“Oh.” Cody blinks. “Oh shit, dude. How’d you know?”

“I could tell the stupid, please.” Yasiel’s smirking, but there’s concern there. “How long? You aren’t you.”

“A couple days.” Cody slumps down onto the couch. Matt’s staring at them, wide-eyed and eavesdropping. “Pregame nap, we woke up like this, and had to come to the stadium for the game before we could like, figure literally anything out. And then we had to fuckin’ play.”

“Explains your bat.” Yasiel nods. “Not good.”

“Nope.”

“You tell Roberts?”

“Nah,” Cody says. “But he's gotta know something is up. Like we can't hit and we're both acting weird.”

Yasiel levels an unimpressed glare at him. “You are. Tell him.”

“How the fuck do I do that?”

“You want me to do it?”

Cody scrunches his nose. “Actually, yeah. If CT doesn't care.”

“I don’t,” Chris says. “Please, go ahead.” He has no idea how to explain any of this— it’s why he’s avoided every call from a family member since he woke up in Cody’s body and only texted back his friends.

“This is not good to keep to yourself,” Yasiel says. “You want me to tell him now or tomorrow?”

“Now,” Cody says, and Chris nods in agreement. It’s already hanging over their heads; adding twelve hours of stress counting down to that conversation won’t help one bit.

“I’m going,” Yasiel says. “You wait here.”

Chris sinks down onto the couch as well. Matt looks from him to Cody and back.

“You really not fucking with us?”

“I think we could come up with a more believable prank if we were,” Chris tells him, pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. “Not like we both simultaneously forgot how to hit and field.”

“Yeah, I was wondering, we were talking about it on the bench.” Matt fiddles with his phone. “Weird shit happened down in San Diego sometimes, you know. We went on a losing streak and burned everyone’s gloves to try make it better. Or once, I think the pitching staff tried to make an offering so the team could get its first no-no. But this is some real weird shit, man, if it’s true.”

“Yo, maybe the Giants cursed us.” Cody shrugs. “I dunno if they can do that, but if anyone would, I bet they would. Or maybe the D-backs. I feel like they hate us a lot right now.”

“I don’t think Freaky Friday was a curse,” Chris tells him. “Also, if MLB teams could curse each other, wouldn’t the front office be all over that?”

“We gotta rewatch it, bro, for reference—”

“Belli.” Kemp nods towards the door, where Roberts is standing, hovering over his shoulder. “Dunno about any curses, but I bet you're being summoned.”

“Oh, shit,” Cody says, and stands, pulling Chris up with him. “Now we gotta explain.”

“Unless he believes Yasi,” Chris points out, and hopes it's the truth.

To his credit, Roberts waits until they're both in the hall to question them. “You what now,” he says, arms crossed. “Start from the beginning.”

“I’m Cody,” Cody says, and waves with Chris’s hand.

Chris waves too, fuck it. “I’m Chris. I swear. I wouldn’t be doing this by choice.”

“And the two of you— if Yasiel’s right, you woke up like this?”

“From a pregame nap, yeah.” Chris looks at Roberts, who, to his credit, hasn’t snapped yet and told them they’re benched if they think this is an appropriate prank to play on the coaching staff. “I don’t know how to prove anything, but I woke up and I was here. And Cody was there. Which is why’s it’s been rough going playing the last couple games.”

“You’re not a lefty.” Roberts hums, looking at them both. “Look, when I was playing, we never had this, but we did weird shit. Thought we were cursed, tried to break curses, who knows if they existed. And then the Sox won in 2004, so maybe whatever it did worked. Honestly, your play the last few days speaks for itself.”

Chris winces, though it’s deserved.

“So I’m gonna take all three of you at face value right now and make the lineups accordingly. For a game. See if it works. Is it the hitting alone—”

“I can’t play short,” Cody says, blunt. “Chris can do it at this level. I can’t. And I can’t bat righty. The game was bad, but BP was a shitshow too.”

“Alright.” Roberts looks between them all again. “We can figure that out. Extra work tomorrow so you can get supervised practice in, I’ll mention it to the hitting coach, bat on the side you need to be on. In the field, we can put you in the outfield and Kiké at short.”

Having a plan makes Chris feel better, knowing he won’t have to twist himself around at the plate, try and be Cody when he’s not. He doesn’t want to tank Cody’s stats if it can be avoided.

“We’ll mention something to the team, too,” Roberts says.

Cody’s shoulders slump, relieved. Chris is right there with him. “Thanks, skip,” he says, and turns to Yasiel too. “Thanks, man.”

“Just want stupid back where he belongs,” Yasi says, manhandling Cody into a hug. It’s harder to move him when he’s in Chris’s body, seems like, a different center of gravity to ground him. “Need to tell the team now, though.”

Chris doesn’t want to be the one to stand up in front of everyone and say it. “I know.”

“Look,” Roberts says. “We’ll send a message around. You both go home tonight and get some rest. Are you driving?”

“We’ve been taking Ubers,” Chris says. “Didn’t want to risk driving, with reaction times and everything.”

“Good. Get in a cab and go home.”

Dismissed, they head back towards the clubhouse, which is mostly empty, guys filtering out. Matt’s still there on the couch with his headphones in, and he raises his eyebrows and waves.

“G’night,” Cody tells him, and starts gathering up his shit. He leans in towards Yasiel. “Hey, man, thanks.”

Yasiel hugs him, and this time Cody curves into him easily, familiarly, even in Chris’s body. Chris waits for them to be done, throwing random shit in his bag. “Thanks,” he says when the two of them break apart. “That made things easier.” He gets a hug too and leans into it. Yasiel’s usually all over Cody, and the two of them have been ducking him for two days. Been ducking almost everyone, too jumpy in the wrong skin for casual touch. Chris inhales before he lets go.

When they head out of Dodger Stadium the parking lot is quiet, traffic inching away from the stadium. Chris calls the Uber and shoves his hands in his pockets, waiting. The temperature’s dropped from game time, the lights of Los Angeles spreading out forever in front of them.

“I’m fucking exhausted,” Cody says. “I’m so tired.”

“Yeah.”

The cab comes quick, and they climb inside. Cody falls asleep, head lolling back against the window. Chris closes his eyes too and waits to get home.

-

When they make it to the stadium the next day, the message has very clearly spread throughout the entirety of the roster. Kiké comes up to them both, Joc a half-step behind him, and he reaches out very slowly and pokes Chris in the face.

Chris blinks at him. “What the fuck, man.”

“Weird ass shit,” Kiké tells Joc, who nods sagely and then pokes Chris too.

Chris glares at him. “Are you fucking kidding me.” Pedro is there too, his hand outstretched, and Chris takes a giant step back, smacking into Cody. “Ow, fuck.”

“Dude,” Cody says, affronted. He looks at Kiké and Joc and Pedro. “Dudes.”

“Yeah, alright,” Kiké says. “That’s him.” He veers off to his stall, apparently satisfied.

The rest of the pitching staff comes up next, led by Kershaw, who’s apparently elected himself leader, Walker hovering over his shoulder along with Strip and Kenta. Chris looks around suspiciously again for poking fingers. You can’t slap away the hand of a starting pitcher.

“Hi,” Kersh says. He’s a respectful few feet away from them both, his arms crossed. “Look. No offense, but can you just….stay away from me. Not touch me. I don't need you ending up in here and blowing up my ERA.”

“Wouldn't wanna be a pitcher even if I could,” Cody says, leaning around Chris. His particular huffy expression looks odd on Chris's face. Chris glances at him.

“Okay.” Kersh looks more suspicious than anything else. “Cool.”

“I’m just saying.” Cody crosses his arms too. “Not my thing.”

“I have to start tomorrow,” Kershaw says. “I don’t want to be in the outfield.”

“I promise I won’t even breathe on you,” Cody says, and, placated, Kershaw sits down. The rest of the pitchers follow his lead like ducklings.

Chris had a pretty nasty changeup back in high school he was proud of, but he can tell now is not the time.

“Well,” Rich says. He’s looking back and forth at everyone like he’s watching tennis. “I thought I wouldn’t see this again outside of the indy leagues, but who the fuck knew.”

Cody holds up a hand. “Wait, wait?.”

“Back on Long Island,” Rich says. “Before I signed my contract. Happened to our pitcher and our catcher. Only for a couple days, and out there at that level, can’t say the pitcher was consistently throwing strikes anyway.”

“You saw this happen,” Cody repeats. “On your team?”

“The Long Island Ducks. 2015, I think?” Rich shrugs. “Kind of just happened. They switched back after a couple days. Said they did something, but they wouldn’t say what it was, and then I signed with the Sox and went up to Triple-A, so I don’t know what came next.”

“Aw, fuck.” Cody sits down in his stall. “And here I was Googling all sorts of weird shit. Clearly I needed to look up the bus leagues.”

“You were researching?” Rich asks.

Cody glares at him. “I was trying, dude. The internet is not crazy helpful. And we tried the Freaky Friday stuff this morning.”

“Who’d’ve thought,” Rich says.

Cody throws a sock at him, and Rick throws his glove back at Cody’s face, and for a moment everything feels briefly normal.

It goes away again when they have to go out on the field. Chris listens to the roar of the crowd and steels himself before he jogs out, waits for the give of the grass under his feet, waits for the game to ground him. It doesn’t come.

-

Now that the team knows, they can go out to dinner with the guys post-game, drink beer and chat, break down the win. Not that Chris isn’t stressed about the whole situation, but it helps. Justin shepherds everyone to a sushi restaurant and after the third slipup remembers whose name to use, Kenta and Will crack their normal jokes. Everyone tiptoes around the topic, considering they’re in public, but it’s a breath of fresh air.

They head home after, too amped up to sleep, lazing around the living room and flipping through Netflix. Neither of them played a full nine innings, but the game went better. Easier. Fewer visible fuck-ups, both in the field and at the plate. Chris hit a slow bouncing grounder but he ran it out, Cody’s long-ass legs helping him get on base.

“That was better,” Chris says, watching the stream of movie and TV titles go by. “Both the game and dinner. I feel way less like shit, man.”

"Same." Cody hovers over one of the Batman movies for a moment before moving on. "More used to it."

The immediate shock has worn off, the loose-fitting feel of their wrong bodies. Chris isn't more comfortable, necessarily, but he's less thrown. Readjusting to a different center of gravity, the way Cody's limbs move, the puzzle of Cody's body. He's had to shave every morning for the past three days, and the razor felt strange in his hand.

Cody finally settles on an episode of Friends they've seen before. "Your taste in clothes sucks, though, man. Everything is plaid? Why's everything plaid, Chris."

Chris looks down at the plaid shirt he's currently wearing, which he pulled out of Cody's dresser this morning, and then pointedly back at Cody.

"That's different," Cody says. "It fits right."

"Probably should've been a dead giveaway something was up," Chris says. "The change in fashion sense."

"Yeah," Cody says. "If you mean the lack of style."

"Swear to god," Chris says, lazy, stretches out and kicks at Cody's thigh. "It's like—" he looks down at his hands. "I keep expecting to see my own hands, you know? Or my feet, or in the field my cleats. Keep getting startled by myself.”

“Mirrors are weird now.” Cody laughs. “Like I feel okay, and then I walk by a window or in the clubhouse, and I’m like whoa, what the fuck.”

“I freaked myself out with the bathroom mirror when I was showering,” Chris admits. “I forgot.”

“Oh, yeah, showering’s weird, whether or not we're in the lockers.” Cody turns down the volume on the television. “Like, no offense to your dick, okay? But I miss my dick.”

“No shit,” Chris says. “I haven’t jerked off since we switched.”

“Wait, really?” Cody sits straight up. “Dude, why?”

“Because it’s not my body?” Chris blinks at him. “It’s your dick.”

“Uh.” From the way Cody’s avoiding eye contact, Chris suddenly knows way too much, holy shit, he didn’t need the image, Cody’s hand wrapped around him, the sounds — he knows what he sounds like, biting back noise, what it’s like when he’s about to come. Imagining Cody like that is too much. Cody coughs. “I just didn’t—”

“Think?” Chris raises his eyebrows. “Yeah, clearly. What the hell, man.”

“I woke up with a boner, and it's _you_. You told me not to be weird!”

That’s not untrue, but. “That wasn’t what I was talking about.” Chris crosses his arms. "So you jerked off in my body. How'd you feel if I jerked off in yours?"

He doesn't know what reaction he's looking for, but Cody's mouth goes slack. God, Chris didn't need to know that would turn him on. "Okay," Chris says, attempting to salvage what's left of the conversation. "Okay, like, I mean, in terms of privacy and shit—"

"I wanna watch," Cody says. He pulls himself together, or tries, tongue darting over his lower lip. "I wouldn't care. I want to see what it looks like."

“What?”

“Look,” Cody says. “Like, ignoring our whole, uh, current situation. Have you legit never thought about it before? Watching yourself?”

“Not particularly,” Chris says. Even the weirdest ‘would you rather’ games on the bus back in college never got that far. “I guess I hooked up with this guy in front of a mirror, but that wasn’t about watching me. And that’s not the same thing as any of this.”

Cody shrugs. “Would you fuck your clone?”

“I don't know if I would either. When the fuck am I going to meet my clone?” Though considering the events of the last few days, maybe Chris should have been preparing himself for the eventuality. Either way, it's clear Cody not only would, but has thought about it in depth. Sometimes Chris wonders what goes on in his head.

“I just want to see,” Cody says. “It's like looking in the mirror but it's better. And I can't — who else would I even ask. I don't want this to happen again and if it did, it's probably not gonna be you in my body.”

“You're so fucking vain, man.”

Cody shrugs again, like, _yeah._ Chris knows his response isn't a no, if Cody trusts him like this.

“Please,” Cody says. “I want to see.”

“Jesus.” Chris presses the heels of his hands against his eyes. He’s too sober for this. He doesn’t know if being drunk would make it better. Worst of all, he’s spent enough time in Cody’s body that he gets the appeal. He's been talking himself out of picturing Cody in panties, pushing down the memory of his dick covered in lace, captured on camera. Not that Chris hasn’t taken dick pics, but Cody’s taking photos posing in fucking lingerie. “Fuck, I can’t believe I’m not saying no to this.”

“Really?” Cody reaches out towards him, then pulls his hand back. “CT— legit, I'd only ask you.”

“Okay.” Exhaling, Chris stands up. He should know better, shouldn’t be so susceptible to Cody’s charms, Cody's trust. It’s hard. Chris usually wants to make him happy, can't help but want to give him what he wants. “You owe me so much, man.”

“Probably already did,” Cody says, and stands up too.

They go into Cody’s bedroom, which means Chris is going to have to change the sheets after they’re done with — this. He sits on the side of the bed. "Are you, uh. Going to stand?"

"Is it weirder if I stand?"

"This is the literally the weirdest thing we've ever done together," Chris says. "And I was there for your rookie dress up day, I have the Elvis photos. And we've done, like, hundreds of dollars worth of weed together. And what about the time where you—"

"Spring training doesn't count." Cody sits down at the corner of the mattress, tension coiled in his torso. “We shook on it, man.”

"Am I like. Stripping for you?"

"I don't know," Cody says, and Chris does know him well enough to know there's no way he thought that far ahead, even if he knew he only wanted Chris here with him. Fuck.

"Alright," he says, and licks his lips, pushing his sweatpants down mid-thigh. "Okay." He's not hard, and normally Cody's hot gaze would help, but it's on his own face and he's not a fucking narcissist. "Okay."

"You should—" Cody clears his throat. "I don't like it, like. Dry. So you should uh. Lick your hand."

"Okay." Chris licks his hand. Maybe it'd be better to look away, but he can't help but stare at each tiny reaction he pulls from Cody. The inhale, or the way his eyelids lower. They're all playing out across Chris's face, and it’s gone from strange to somehow hot. That's what he looks like when he's turned on. That's what desire looks like on him. Cody wants him, at least this once, and they've got it all backwards.

He wraps his hand around his dick and gives it a couple slow pulls. Normally when he's on his own he does that, starts slow and then gradually speeds up, when he has the time to draw it out, not a quick jerk in the shower. The sensations are different — his hand is catching on different spots, pulling out reactions he doesn’t expect. When he thumbs over the head it makes him shudder involuntarily. Cody must be more sensitive there, and Chris does it again, swallowing against the jump in his stomach.

"Yeah, uh." Cody sounds hoarse. "I like it like that."

"I don't, really."

"I— noticed."

"Oh, when you were jerking me off, yeah." Chris probably shouldn't be this sarcastic when he has his hand around Cody's dick, when he's putting on a show for him.

"Yeah, well." Cody hugs his knees to his chest. "You like it slow, your body liked it when I went slow. And when I stopped myself from coming at first and then waited before doing it. You liked that too."

"I do," Chris says. Fuck it. "You, uh— um. How should I—"

"Go faster," Cody says. "Not much— like that. Yeah."

Chris goes faster, licks his hand again when it starts to get too dry. When precome starts to leak from the head the slide gets even easier, better. Cody's gaze is dark and heavy and it's still strange but he looks so intense, mouth open, staring. His knees have to be pulled up at this point to hide that he's hard, and that's. That's a good thought too. He stretches a little, getting more comfortable. He wonders if there's anything else Cody likes he isn't saying. If Cody puts on the underwear he hides in his top drawer, teases himself through the lace, or if he wears it out and relishes the secret that nobody knows what he's got on under his sweatpants, no one would ever, ever guess. If that's what he jerks off to, that feeling, hot at the base of his spine.

"Fuck," Cody says, half-exclamation and half-groan. Chris doesn't know if he knows he said it. Doesn’t know if Cody’s into him here or watching his body get off, but he's getting into it now, chasing the orgasm.

Cody shifts closer, his toes brushing up against Chris's ankle. Chris thumbs back over the head of his dick again and then goes for it, jerking himself hard and fast, his feet flexing.

"Are you going to—" Cody says, and Chris comes before he finishes his sentence, body seizing up, spilling over his hand. It’s good, different, his mind going blank, back flattening out into the mattress.

"Uh," he says, when he comes back to himself. "I, uh."

"That was." Cody's voice is barely a breath. "That was fuckin’ hot. That you did that.”

"Are you—" Chris gestures vaguely at Cody's legs. Him doing it, that’s something. "You should. I don't care now, really, I don't."

"Okay," Cody says on an exhale, getting rid of his pants in a hurry. "Okay, yeah." He starts to jerk off sitting, hand curved around Chris's dick, movements sure enough that Chris can tell he was experimenting, trying to figure out how Chris's body worked. What felt good. He rubs his hand over his lower abdomen, groaning.

“You, uh,” Chris says. “You— when you did this before.”

“Your abs are _insane_.” Cody drags his hand up and down his dick, free hand trailing over his chest. “Like, all I want is to touch them.”

“It's my workout regime?” Chris offers weakly, eyes affixed to the way Cody's moving. He's had sex in front of a mirror, once or twice, not his thing, but this is different. It's both him and not him. The secondhand embarrassment is gone, and Cody’s so clearly into touching him.

Cody isn’t trying to put on a show, nor is he trying to draw anything out. He’s figured out enough about what makes Chris’s body tick that he clearly enjoys it when he comes, shoulders hunching and head falling forward. But Chris— it’s Cody, he knows it’s _Cody_ , and watching Cody come is a lot. Cody’s shoulders drop and he looks up with a sleepy smile that’s all his and Chris’s chest squeezes, his face gets hot.

His own body doesn’t blush like this, and on the rare occasion he does it’s generally hidden underneath the beard, but Cody’s face flushes easily under his tan.

“See?” Cody says. He sounds incredibly smug, a little fucked out, all from jacking off. “Told you.”

“Yeah,” Chris says. His mouth is dry. He doesn’t know when that happened. “Yeah. Uh.”

“Uh,” Cody echoes. “Probably, like, should—” he gestures vaguely in the direction of the bathroom.

“Yeah,” Chris says, and goes to the hall bathroom to clean himself up. He can’t even stare at his face in the mirror and figure out what the hell they did, because it’s Cody’s face, and seeing Cody’s face will freak him out on an even more fundamental level. But it was _good_ , the awkwardness somehow hitting pause, and Cody wanted to watch him, put on a show for him in return. He doesn’t know what that means.

He ends up back in Cody's bedroom, tossing and turning in bed before he goes to take a shower, scrubbing off under too-hot water.

If it was bad they could laugh about it, but it wasn’t. Chris got a real flash of what it’d be like to get what he wanted, with Cody. He doesn't think they'll be able to laugh about it.

He wonders what it means, conversely, that Cody can jerk off in front of him and ask for the same, but he lies about his panties and hides the photos in his phone. Chris doesn't think of him as someone to keep secrets. Cody rambles when he's drunk, told Chris two days after they met about his most embarrassing in-game fuck up, owned up to his high school crush and which member of the 1988 Dodgers he'd want to bang. Part of why they work so well as roommates is that Cody's willing to talk, happily fills the space when Chris doesn't know what to say. Chris gets the hiding, but he doesn't like not knowing.

-

They play a couple more games. They don’t talk about what they did. No one gets injured, neither of them are noticeably awful. They’re not much better than mediocre, but the rest of the team can cover for mediocrity. That’s how it works. You pick your guys up, and they return the favor. There’s a short road trip they handle, though the boos in the opposing stadium feel different. The crowd’s booing Cody, not him.

Chris doesn’t forget, but sometimes it’s more apparent than others, his awareness. He thinks about waking up in Cody’s body, the memory of it already seared into his brain. Looking at Cody in the mirror. The lace underwear cutting across his hips. How hot and intent Cody’s gaze was, watching him jerk off, watching him come.

That’s an awful thought to have in the opposing dugout in front of a hostile crowd. Chris stashes it away for when they get home.

-

Cody’s out, doing something with Joc that Chris thinks boils down to ‘eating tacos and playing video games and pretending everything is normal’. He's stuck in his head too. Time apart doesn’t sounds like the worst thing right now.

He watches TV, texts a few of his friends from back home, scrolls through Instagram. He should make an effort to be social. Someone on the team has to be around, someone who knows what’s going on. Chris looks at his phone again, scrolls through his contacts, and tosses it aside.

Ever since the switch he’s been sleeping in Cody’s room. He walks to it, shouldering open the door. Cody hasn’t said anything about the contents of his drawers. For all intents and purposes, he doesn’t know what Chris knows.

Chris pulls open the top drawer and looks inside. Everything is there, undisturbed, exactly like it was left. He reaches and grabs blindly for the first scrap of lace he feels.

The underwear is light in his hand, and he’s — doing this. Not thinking about it. Fuck. He puts the panties on top of the dresser and strips out of his clothes, leaving them in a pile on the floor, doesn’t look in the mirror yet. He pulls the underwear more carefully over his hips, tucks his dick in. It distends the waistband a little bit, pushing out; it must be so much more if Cody’s wearing them when he’s hard.

Chris shouldn’t be doing this. This is Cody’s _thing_ , apparently, private enough he’s willing to hide it from his roommate in the back of a drawer. But he’s in Cody’s body and it’s been eating him up inside. Cody doesn't keep secrets, tends to be easy to read. Chris wants to understand.

The bralettes are more confusing, all softer pieces of jersey-lined lace, and he doesn’t pull any of them over his head, doesn’t want to stretch out anything he shouldn’t. Instead he looks at himself in the mirror, how Cody’s long torso juts down into the vee of the underwear, dick pressed up against the lace, the dark blue contrasting with the pale skin on his belly, his farmer’s tan. He presses his hand over the bulge of his dick and bites his lip in surprise at how readily it responds, to both the pressure and everything he can see in the mirror.

“You’re a fuckin’ hypocrite,” he tells himself. But it’s Cody in the mirror, generally unashamed. Chris tries looking into his own eyes, keeping it direct. He’s mostly hard now. It’s not working. “Fuck,” he says, and divests himself of the panties, leaving them on the floor, before he flops back on the bed and gets himself off fast and hard, thinking about Cody wearing the underwear— how he’d looked in the panties— how Cody would look wearing them for him, spread out on a bed for him, fuck, fuck, he’s such a hypocrite, he’s so fucked.

-

“Bro,” Cody says, holding out his phone. His eyes are wide. Chris has never particularly paid attention to his own eyelashes, but now he’s looking at Cody behind them all the time, he’s noticed how long they are. Good job him, he guesses. “Chris, dude, check out Fangraphs.”

Chris takes the phone and skims the blog post. It seems like standard stats analysis— he’d read a bunch when he was overhauling his swing, after talking to Josh Donaldson on the Jays, and then the coach he’d hired— talking about, for all appearances, him batting lefty and Cody batting righty.

“I figured the beats would all notice,” he says, handing the phone back. “Makes sense that one of these guys did too.”

Cody gives it to him again. “No, the ending.”

Looking again, Chris sees it, a joke about them switching places. “Oh. Yeah.” He rereads the line. It has to be tongue-in-cheek; he’s pretty sure stats websites don’t seriously consider bodyswapping when they’re analyzing play. “I think he was just making a joke. I don’t think you can tell from watching BP video on Twitter or anything.”

“Like, I know that?” Cody’s gnawing his lip again. “I started thinking, what if one of our families visits, or my bros from home wanna know why I’ve been ditching their calls— the team knows, but I just, like, don’t think it can stay like this forever.”

“No, you’re right.” Chris looks at the article and sighs. He’s been avoiding his family too. “It’s not great. Like no one will take that seriously, I don’t think, but it's not good.”

“I miss being tall.”

Chris is not going to win that argument. “Yeah, well, I miss not worrying you're going to accidentally shave off my beard.”

“That'd be on purpose. You could have the sickest mustache.”

“We can ask Dave again if they’ve worked anything out,” Chris says. He’s going to ignore the mustache comment for now. If Cody does anything to his facial hair there’s time to plot out revenge later, maybe more public and on the team plane so he’s really fucked. “I mean it, you’re right. I want to switch back. And I don’t want to have a weird conversation with someone from Fangraphs.”

“I’m gonna Google again,” Cody says. “There has to be something on the internet. People try shit all the time.”

-

Cody comes up to him three hours later, hair sticking up like he’s been running his hands through it, his laptop tucked haphazardly under his arm. “I think we should fuck,” he says.

Chris is lying on the couch, tossing a baseball up and down, and trying to convince his parents texting is fine, they don’t need to hear his voice. It isn’t quite working. He doesn’t catch the baseball and it hits him, hard, in the chin. “Ow, Jesus Christ. What? You want to what?”

“There are movies,” Cody says. “About people switching bodies.”

“If you’re talking about porn—”

“No, like, it’s a thing. Ryan Reynolds is in one of them.”

“Ryan Reynolds is in a porno?”

“It’s a real movie.” Cody leans down and picks up the baseball, starts tossing it back and forth. “The other movie they had, like, a sex toy and switched because of the sex toy. And one of them was on Pornhub, fine, but I’m trying my best here.”

“And you think we should fuck,” Chris says. He looks down at his phone, thumbing away a text.

“I am shit out of ideas.” Cody sits down next to him on the couch, pushing his legs out of the way. “And like. We tried the Freaky Friday thing. Running really hard at each other didn’t work.”

It decidedly did not. Chris still has the bruise on his ass, tender and sore to the touch, from bouncing off Cody and falling ass-first to the floor.

“This wasn’t in Freaky Friday,” Chris points out. “If you’re using movies for research.”

“Uh, no, that’d be fucked up.” Cody frowns. “Maybe we should watch the movie again first. It’s like the OG bodyswap film. I totally could have missed something important because I was reading the summary on Wikipedia.”

“You want to watch Freaky Friday before we sleep with one another, which you decided because of a movie with a magic sex toy.”

“Yes?”

“You know what,” Chris says. “Sure. Why not.” He thinks he should protest more but it makes as much sense as anything else about their current situation. And considering they've already jerked it in front of each other, he guesses it's not as huge a step as it seems. “You really want to have sex about this.”

Cody blinks at him, and then nods, a tight twist to his mouth. “Rich said he’d try and contact those guys from the indy leagues and like, total radio silence. The front office doesn’t have anything.” Cody frowns. “I’m not getting a concussion because I try to run into you again. We didn’t have a fight. If the Giants or DBacks cursed us, I don’t know. Far as we know, this just happened.”

He’s right. Chris has racked his brains trying to figure out what it was. Maybe there didn’t have to be anything: Random, bad luck, one more thing in a season that started off bad and got worse before it got better. And if a rival team did curse them, they sure as hell aren’t saying.

“It’s sex,” Cody says. “It doesn’t have to be, like, a big deal, we don’t have to make it a big deal.”

They watch _Freaky Friday_ , sitting with more distance between them on the couch than they usually keep. Cody tends to sprawl, sticks his feet in Chris’s lap or leans on his shoulder. Right now he's sitting upright with his hands folded in his lap. They’re gonna fuck soon, for real. It’s an artificial divide between them, but if Cody touched him, Chris knows he’d go rigid and stiff, knows that’s not what they need.

On screen, Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis realize it’s all about understanding each other on a deeper level. Chris wishes that was their problem. He’s never had an issue with Cody like that. Chris thinks back to finding out he was getting traded from the Mariners, knowing he needed to get his shit together, he had the tools and the Dodgers believed in him. Fixing his swing. Spring training, and meeting Cody for the first time, not someone he’d heard about the same way he’d heard about guys in LA like Kersh, Yasiel, JT, Chase. He remembers thinking Cody was kind of an idiot, but in a way where Cody made him smile more than he felt anyone should. And then moving in together in spring training, getting sent down to OKC at the same time, saying they’d both be back up.

When he got the call, after a winter of working to fix himself, it’d been great. He remembers standing in the living room of their gross-ass Oklahoma City apartment, Cody lying on the couch saying Chris would see him soon, grinning all delighted up at him. He’d been right.

Of course, if this was the movies, they’d switch back and win the World Series and get everything they want. Chris knows how Hollywood works.

The movie ends and Cody watches the credits, blue TV screen light washing over his face. “I think we need to do it,” he says. “I think if this keeps on going it’s gonna be bad for both of us.”

“Yeah.” Chris looks at him. He’s looking at his own profile— that’s going to be jarring every time he thinks about it. But he knows it’s Cody in there, and the vulnerability around his mouth, the set of his shoulders, that isn’t Chris’s body, it’s all Cody. “You’re okay with this?”

“I guess, yeah.”

Chris bites his lip. “Have you ever taken it up the ass? Either with a girl, or—”

“I haven't, uh, actually.” Cody flushes. “Done that yet. With either, like, either way. So.” He sticks his chin out. “I bought lube, though. I already have condoms.”

“I’ve done it,” Chris says, what the fuck ever, he got bored as shit in Iowa in the minors and had a phone with access to Grindr, and he'd let his college girlfriend fuck him before that during the winter, before the baseball season started in earnest. “So it's, you know, what do you want to happen like. Body-wise. If we’re gonna.”

“Right.”

“If you don’t wanna, like. If you can’t decide right now. You can think about it some and we can plan for tomorrow.”

“No, we have the off day. We shouldn’t do it after a game.” Cody’s looking anywhere but him, and it’s making his chest ache. He’s right. If this keeps on going it won’t magically get better. It doesn't have to mean anything. It’s just sex. What’s sex when they’ve already jerked off in front of each other, when they’ve lived as each other, done every mundane bit and piece of humanity in each other’s skin.

Chris knows it’s not nothing. He knows. He wishes he knew for sure if it was nothing to Cody, or if his hesitation is nerves alone.

“You did it.”

“Yeah.”

“More than once?”

“Yeah.” Chris thinks that matters, whatever Cody needs to decide.

“Okay.” Cody looks up. “So then you, like, do that and I’ll— fuck you, I guess, and hopefully then we. We switch and we’re alright.”

“Okay,” Chris echoes him. That's for sure a plan. ”And then you know, another time, if you want to — then you can. Under better circumstances.” With me or without me, he doesn’t say. Doesn’t know if he’s offering anything, if he should, no matter how much he might want to.

“Right.” Cody bites at his lip again. If this works, Chris is going to have to go out and buy lip balm, to cover up the chapped skin from Cody constantly biting and licking his lips. “You really like it?”

“Yeah,” Chris says. “Maybe your body is different but I do.”

“Okay.” Cody laughs, shaky. “I miss being tall, man. I want this to work.”

“For the last time—”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re not short.” He holds his hands up. “Do we, uh—”

“Kiss?” Chris’s mouth quirk. They’ve done so much shit in each other’s bodies and they haven’t kissed. Not that there was a reason to before but he wants to now. “It's just a kiss, right?” Cody blinks, somehow surprised, and Chris plows forward. “C’mere, I guess, yeah.”

Every guy he’s kissed has been more or less clean-shaven. He’s always been the one with the beard. Chris bends down and cups Cody’s face. It’s his own, but it’s Cody in there, and— he closes his eyes. The beard’s soft against his cheeks. Cody’s mouth opens under his eagerly and Chris pushes in, curling his hand around the back of Cody’s neck. He’s kissing Cody, he knows it’s Cody, the breathy noises Cody’s making against his mouth might be the wrong pitch but that response is all him. Cody’s lips are chapped like he knew they’d be.

Inside his chest, there’s a shift, a settlement.

“That — works,” Cody says. He’s grinning, eyes crinkled at the corners, clearly pushed aside whatever indecision he had before. “Damn, CT.”

“Not even taking credit? Must have been real impressive.” Chris presses with his fingertips against Cody’s neck, watches how Cody’s mouth falls open again and then kisses the dumbfounded look right off his face. Cody shifts in closer, until he’s standing almost between Chris’s legs, and Chris drags his hand down Cody’s back, settles it on the curve of his ass.

“It’s like, weird from this angle,” Cody mumbles, mouth in the vicinity of Chris’s jaw. There’s a graze of his teeth, and Chris hisses. Clearly Cody knows what spots get his body going. “But super fucking hot.”

“If this works then you end up with the hickey.”

“Yeah, that’s hot too.” Another sharp pull of his mouth, and then a softer kiss, soothing away the sting. Chris presses his thumb against Cody’s collarbone and lets himself enjoy the kisses, lets himself have this.

Eventually he says, “I need to get ready so we can, you know.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Cody steps back. “Right. Should I, uh.”

“I”m gonna do this part,” Chris tells him. “Unless you want to—?”

“Watch, yeah,” Cody says, like that was ever in question. They go to Cody’s room, getting rid of their clothes, arranging themselves on the bed. Chris wonders if Cody’s ever left lingerie on the floor, stripping for someone else. Or if he keeps them on.

“Alright.” They need to get started. Chris grabs the lube Cody bought out of the nightstand, slicks his fingers up and draws a leg up to his chest, squirming until he’s comfortable. If Cody hasn’t— he’ll start with one, see how Cody’s body reacts, relax into it.

Cody’s watching with big eyes, his mouth open. His tongue darts out to wet his lower lip, and Chris would wonder what he’s thinking except he can see Cody getting turned on, by watching, by watching this being done to him. He works his finger in and says, “Oh,” surprised.

“I wanted to do this,” Cody says. “I’d jerk off and think about trying.”

“Getting fucked?” Chris asks. Cody's staring at his hand. Chris wants to make it more of a show for him. He strokes his dick with his free hand, does it again when Cody's breath catches. He can feel himself relaxing, presses with his middle finger and takes another, up to two now. “Really?”

“I don’t know why,” Cody says. “Like, being inside, uh, someone. Or being full.” He cups his dick, squeezes, and Chris looks back at him, greedy, seizing the chance. Maybe he’s not as vain as Cody is, but there’s always something good about watching someone else watch you. 

“We’re going slow at first,” Chris warns him. He can tell he's almost ready, adds some more lube to ease the slide. “Don’t wanna hurt either of us.”

“Yeah,” Cody exhales, and keeps staring. Chris’s dick is half-hard, lying on his stomach. He ghosts his free hand over it again, sighing at the touch, and Cody’s eyes get even wider.

“I can’t believe I know you jerk off in front of the mirror now,” Chris says and Cody laughs breathlessly.

“That obvious?”

Chris laughs at him, scissors his fingers. It’s good, the pressure against his rim, and he bites his lip against the moan threatening to slip out. “After earlier? Yeah, man. Hey, I think, ah— you can. Come here.”

“Oh.” Cody scrambles up onto his knees. “How should we, uh.”

Hands and knees is probably best, but Cody probably wants to see him, and Chris wants to give him that, at least, if they’re doing this. He grabs a pillow and stuffs it under his hips. “Like this.”

“Oh, sick,” Cody says. He slides the condom on, holding his dick. “Dude.”

Chris reaches down and starts to guide him in, hissing at the blunt pressure, the breach of Cody’s dick against his opening. “Slow,” he says, a reminder, and Cody follows orders, inching in. His shoulders are tight with tension, holding back. Cody’s body hasn’t ever done this before, but Chris has, and he knows how he likes it. “You’re doing good,” he tells Cody. “Just like that, yeah.”

When Cody’s fully inside he takes a moment to look down at Chris, look down at himself taking it. He’s already flushed behind the beard, breathless, and Chris has an out-of-body moment knowing this is what people he sleeps with usually see. He wonders if they see the naked desire, or if that’s not him. If that’s Cody shining through, something in his eyes Chris can pretend is longing.

“Hey,” Chris says, and reaches up, pats him on the shoulder. “Hey, you’re okay.”

“No, it’s.” Cody’s teeth dig into his lip again. “Good.”

Chris wants to tell him to take a minute, it’s okay if he needs it. But he doesn’t, waits until Cody exhales, his hips twitching. “Alright,” Cody says, and starts to move.

He’s rocking slowly in and Chris does his best to meet him. Their rhythm is off, but he’s always liked the stretch, how it feels to let someone in like this. He wraps a hand around his dick, stroking himself a couple times, and Cody’s gaze follows him.

“You can go faster,” Chris tells him.

Cody nods and snaps his hips, and that’s— that works, Cody’s body likes the sharp stretch, the friction. Chris swallows hard and nods back and Cody does it again, starts to fuck him, putting his back into it. Chris watches his own face react until he has to close his eyes so he can listen. Cody’s panting, soft and harsh, movements growing more confident. Chris shifts for better leverage, keeps jacking himself off.

“You look— I look—god.” Cody fucks in hard. Chris wants to ask Cody if he’s thinking about how he’d look if it was him getting fucked, if he’d like that. Chris could show him. Help him try, see how much he could like it too. “I don’t think—”

“Yeah,” Chris says. He opens his eyes again. “No, like that, yeah.” For another long moment all he can hear is the sound of their breath, the bed squeaking underneath them, the thump-thump-thump as the bedframe bangs and bangs against the wall. Cody wraps a hand around his shoulder and squeezes, then folds himself in so he can jam their mouths together, a hard messy kiss. Chris kisses him back, bites Cody’s lower lip, and Cody’s hips stutter. He’s trembling. Chris runs a hand down his back and he doesn’t stop trembling.

Cody comes after that, kissing him, their mouths open and brushing together. He collapses on top of Chris when he’s done, eyes wide, like he thought they’d switch back as soon as he came.

“Uh,” Chris says, and shifts. “Condom, man.”

“Oh!” Cody raises his head. “Can I—”

“Yeah, just be careful.”

Cody pulls out slowly, then looks at Chris. “You didn’t, uh.” He gestures down at Chris’s dick.

“Take a minute,” Chris says, then thinks about what he wants. “Then you can help me out.” If Chris’s dick is Cody’s dick, he's sure this is gonna be the best damn handjob he’s had in a while. Cody heads into the bathroom and Chris stretches, kicking away the pillow out from underneath him. He’s had better sex, but — he wants to see what Cody looks like when it’s him, when it’s his face, how he’d look stunned as someone — as Chris, fuck, he wants to do it — as Chris pushes into him.

He takes a breath.

“Alright,” Cody says, flopping down next to him. He curls his hand around Chris’s dick. “I’m gonna kiss you, dude.”

Chris laughs — how could he not — and tilts his head so Cody can, their mouths sliding together. Cody drags his hand along the length of his dick, rubs his thumb underneath the head and kisses Chris’s neck. He touches him with the ease of experience, and Chris relaxes, rocks up into Cody’s grip. He comes over Cody’s hand, groaning into Cody’s mouth, his own beard scratching against his cheeks.

When he’s fully back, Cody’s yawning, and Chris isn’t much more awake. Cody stands up and casts about for a tissue before wiping his hand on one of the dirty shirts on the floor. Chris watches him do it, doesn’t care about the laundry.

“Just sleep here,” he says, because who cares at this point, they’ve been inside each other. “Come on. It’s late.”

Cody crawls in next to him, and the expression he’s wearing makes Chris look so _young_ , uncertain, five-plus years wiped away in the blink of an eye. “You think in the morning it’ll work?” he asks. “We were asleep when we switched the first time.”

“I hope so.” Chris plugs his phone in and turns out the light. “Guess we’ll find out.” He closes his eyes on that note, forces them to stay shut.

He dreams again, scattered vague things, full of baseball and not-baseball and Cody is in all of them. They’re back in their proper bodies, but other things are going wrong, they’re chasing something — he’s not sure what it is. He feels like he’s reaching for an object entirely out of his grasp.

The sun spills in through his windows when he wakes up, too early. They forgot to close the blinds. Chris groans and throws an arm over his face and then pauses, because his arm feels _right_ again. He touches his hands to his face and touches scruff: most of his beard, minus the parts Cody must have fucked up minutely shaving. He looks to his left and Cody is sleeping with his mouth open, eyes closed and lashes sweeping shadows over his cheekbones.

He looks good from this angle. Fuck, Chris is so relieved to see him from this angle.

“Cody,” he says, reaches out and shoves at Cody’s shoulder. “Wake up.”

Cody’s eyes snap open. “What? It’s so fuckin’ early— oh, shit. Oh my god. I’m back.”

“Yeah.” Chris stretches his arms over his head, luxuriates in the way his muscles shift. _His_ muscles, moving familiarly under his skin. He’s never going to take this for granted again. “It worked, man.”

“Thank god. My batting average was gonna be fucked.”

“Just yours?”

“Whatever.” Cody beams hopefully at him. “IHOP? Celebratory IHOP? Holy shit, dude.”

“I know you’re trying to get me to drive,” Chris says, but. Getting to drive in his car in his own body. “Yeah, sure.”

“I’ll pay!” Cody slides out of bed, then looks down at himself, how he’s buck naked. “Oh, right. Sorry, uh.”

“We—” Chris swallows. He can feel the ghost of Cody's mouth on his skin. “Don’t have to talk right now.” They have to, but he wants to stay happy that last night worked. Everything is more complicated, waking up, but at least he’s back with his own muscles, his own bones.

“Cool, yeah.” Cody reaches blindly and grabs a pair of Chris’s sweats off the floor. They’re too short for him, now that’s he’s in his proper body, and he has to cinch them tighter around the waist for them to fit. “I wanna get food.”

Chris gets up himself, pulling on boxers. He needs a shower. “Twenty minutes?”

Cody nods and heads off, presumably to stare at himself in the mirror and also shower or do whatever it is he does in the mornings. Put on a pair of— Chris isn’t going to think about that one right now either. He gets in his own shower and scrubs off quickly, until he smells like body wash and not like sex, rinsing off the scent of what they did last night, trying not to think about how clinging to him nine hours later. He washes his hair and luxuriates in leaning down and touching his toes, feeling the stretch in the backs of his thighs. He’s never taking this for granted again.

Once he’s done he gets dressed. He missed his own clothes. Everything Cody owns is too tight, too fitted, and he’s not gonna go down that mental road again. He gets jeans and a t-shirt and smooths down his hair in the mirror. It doesn’t slick into the occasional cowlick like Cody’s does. They meet at the front door and pile into Chris’s car. He drives the short distance to IHOP, doesn’t make fun of Cody for singing along off-key under his breath to the radio. Cody gets his ridiculous breakfast crepe, and Chris gets a pancake and eggs like a normal person, and they talk about what a relief it’ll be to play baseball in their own bodies.

“I’m not a shortstop,” Cody says. “It’s chill, but man, I do not want to play short.”

“I love playing short.” Chris grins at him, slurping down more coffee. “So I’ll take my position back, thanks.”

“All fuckin’ yours.” Cody nudges him under the table. “I’ll fight you for center, though.”

“Yeah, okay.” God, everything feels so good. So right. He didn’t fit in Cody’s skin, and it’s a relief to not have to be hyper-aware of every action, limbs moving wrong, or making sure he was behaving enough like Cody and less like himself.

-

So they’re not gonna talk about the lingerie thing, which is cool; they aren’t talking about the mutual jerking off either, or the actual sex. They run down everything else that happened while they were switched, but. Definitely don’t bring up the kissing, which Chris is stuck on, doing it properly, running his hand through Cody’s hair, pressing his lips to the spot at the corner of Cody’s jaw and neck. Kissing without any aim in mind, not to switch back but because they want to. He wants to..

-

They tell Roberts they’re back, tell the pitching staff, who finally relax around them now that they’re less at risk to end up in the infield. Chris does a pile of laundry and doesn’t ask about helping out with Cody’s.

When they're getting ready in the morning he catches himself looking at the line of Cody's ass under his sweatpants, which are of course too baggy and too thick to show anything. Still— Cody could have one of his thongs on right now and Chris would have no idea. On one hand, he gets it, how that’s a turn-on. On the other hand, he hates not knowing.

“Chris?”

“Huh?” Chris blinks. Cody's snapping his fingers in front of his face. “What?”

“I said, I'm gonna shower and then we can go. You're spacing out like crazy.”

Chris pulls himself together. “Okay, cool. The game. Sounds good.”

Cody squints at him suspiciously before wandering off to his bathroom. Chris absolutely does not watch him go.

He spends the afternoon after a day game shopping, picks up a couple things for the apartment before ending up in a department store. He needs new jeans, wanders through the men’s section before he ends up looping around. Women’s intimates is across the store. He wonders if Cody’s ever come here. He can’t pick out if Cody bought individual pieces here or not.

If he bought something, left it for Cody, maybe he’d wear it. Chris wouldn’t know, but it’d show him — fuck, that he’s thinking about it, at least, that it’s okay.

“Can I help you?”

“Oh, uh—” Chris looks at the saleswoman, who looks like she’s about his mother’s age. She’s smiling at him guilelessly. Maybe she can smell the desperation. Or, fuck, the impending commission. “Um, sure. I’m looking for a, a present. For my girlfriend.” He’s not sure the lie works.

“That’s great.” She starts walking with purpose away from the stockings, so maybe it did, or maybe she sees this all the time. “Do you know her size?”

“Not really?” Cody’s slim for a guy, especially for a pro athlete. When he steals Chris’s sweats, which is often, he always looks stunned when they slip down his hips, when he has to pull the drawstring tight just so they stay up. Chris gestures roughly, circling his hands around an imaginary waist. “Something like that, maybe.”

“Alright.” She squints at him. Her name tag says Joanne. “I can try and work with that. Maybe we’ll stick with small/medium/large sizing.”

“Awesome,” Chris says, relieved. He should have thought this out at all, but if he did, he’d have walked right out of the store and back to the parking lot.

She shows him a few things in blue and black and lavender and he says he’ll take all of it, not sure what exactly is what and not wanting to think too closely about it, lest he start picturing Cody in— whatever that silk mesh thing is, flaring out over his narrow hips, or the underwear with a price tag high enough it makes his eyes go wide.

Joanne gets her commission, he’s sure of it.

“Can you gift wrap?” Chris asks, handing over his credit card at the register. They can, and do, and he brings everything home and stashes it in the back of his closet. He’ll work up to it.

He jerks off again that night to the thought of Cody in the lingerie, can picture it too clearly now, straight from memory. If they hadn’t already fucked it’d be a problem; as it stands, it’s compounding an existing one. He thinks about kissing Cody. Thinks about sliding his hand down over the curve of Cody’s ass, the slip of silk and lace under his palm, and comes, biting his lip to not make noise.

Chris has spent a significant portion of the last 48 hours thinking about exactly how fucked his is, and it’s only gonna get worse from here.

He waits until Cody is out the next morning getting his usual breakfast crepe at IHOP before leaving the tissue-wrapped packages on his unmade bed. He’ll be back in an hour or so — Chris takes his time getting his shit together before he leaves to go work out at the stadium. He doesn’t need to, but he’s got the nervous energy to burn and he still feels half-unsettled in his own body. Might as well.

When he gets back into the apartment, dripping sweat, Cody’s home and playing Fortnite on the couch. He dies and restarts twice before he acknowledges Chris is back and then refuses to meet Chris’s eyes when he hands him a controller.

So that’s also going well.

Cody outlasts him twice before they go to Chavez Ravine. No one said Chris was good at video games anyway.

-

They fall back into a pretty regular status quo. It helps that the team goes on a road trip, and it’s harder to be weird around each other when you aren’t spending too much time alone on the couch in your apartment. Cody sits with Yasiel on the plane out, the two of them locked in a weird wrestling match Chris has no desire to get in the middle of. After the first day back no one’s bugging them about their experiences, once Cody swore up and down Chris wasn’t hiding any embarrassing birthmarks and that they mostly hung out and didn’t try to pick up girls as each other. Kershaw is still suspicious when no one is looking, but Chris can’t blame him, after all his injuries.

He ends up next to Justin towards the front of the plane, dozing. They’re making their way towards the Midwest. Chris used to be so stunned flying to games — when they went to Omaha in college for the College World Series, he spent the flight with his face pressed up against the window, watching the flat middle of the United States spool out underneath them. Now he tries to get as much sleep as he can.

“Nice to be back?” Justin asks. He’s eating pretzels, offers the bag. Chris takes a few.

“Yeah,” he says. He’s striking out more, but that’s been a issue the whole season. He won’t blame it on the bodyswap when it’d be disingenuous to pretend otherwise. “Too much longer and I think our mechanics would have been seriously fucked.”

“I’m sure,” Justin says. “You worked hard on fixing those.”

The fear remains in the back of his mind that one day everything he’s worked for will disappear. It always is. Chris pops a couple more pretzels into his mouth. “Mostly glad to be done tripping over shit. Cody has too much leg.”

“He was complaining about how short you are.” Justin laughs at the look on his face. “Must have been disorienting.”

“For sure.” Chris doesn’t know how much he wants to talk about it. He and Cody haven’t after that first morning back, and Justin doesn’t know the half of it. “Getting dressed in the morning sucked. All his shirts are too tight, and his BP stuff’s a mess. He tears the neck of literally every tee he owns.”

Justin laughs like he’s supposed to, but: “I wanted to check in, make sure you really were okay.”

“Yeah,” Chris says. “I mean, I have to be.”

“That’s not what—” Justin frowns. “Alright.”

“It’s fine.” Chris looks back to where Cody’s sitting, head lolling on Yasiel’s shoulder. Yasiel’s watching a movie on his phone, arm around him. They sit together on the plane pretty often, he and Cody, but space is good, it’s fine. “Just need a little room. Whole thing was closer than most people get in their entire lives, you know?”

“Even on a baseball team.” Justin nods. “Either of you need anything—”

“We’ll come to you, not to Kersh, got it.” Chris starts looking for his eye mask. They won’t land for a couple hours yet.

“Yep.” Justin squeezes his elbow. “It’ll work out. You know Belli. Don’t think he can stay mad.”

It’s not Cody being mad Chris is worried about. “I know,” he says. “Thanks.”

-

Overall, they do well on the road trip. Their record’s getting way more than respectable, now; they’re several games over .500 and while the division is going to be a marathon to the finish, at least it’s a race. After their start, it’s a fucking gift. Alone in his hotel room, coming off a series’ worth of good play, Chris jerks off to the idea of Cody wearing the lace underwear he bought. That’s his own secret to keep.

They get home late at night after a flight delay, everyone grumpy and exhausted when the plane lands. Cody’s not making much eye contact, still. Chris drives them back to the apartment and puts the radio on to fill the empty air between them. When they get home they ditch their bags at the door and he should let everything lie, go to his own room. That’d be the smart thing to do.

Cody’s the one to bring it up, and Chris is fucking relieved, doesn’t try and duck the question. It’s two in the morning. They can’t wait any longer.

“What you bought me.” They made it to the living room before either of them spoke. Cody was looking at the floor as he walked, but he manages to drag his gaze up and look Chris in the eye. “Why’d you do that?”

“I wanted to,” Chris says. Cody deserves more of an answer than that. “I thought it’d look good on you. So.”

“They—” Cody scuffs his foot along the hardwood. “They are. I mean, they do. So.”

“After everything that happened.” Chris looks back at him. “You were wearing it when we switched. And I can’t stop thinking about it. Not fucking, but the first day, when I woke up and you had the panties on.”

“I figured, but I thought you weren’t gonna bring it up. Cause, y’know. It’s—”

“Hot,” Chris mutters.

“I was gonna say weird.” Cody twists his fingers in the hem of his t-shirt. “Wait, really?”

“At first I thought it was a superstition thing,” Chris admits. “Because of the losing, all that, and I was like, weird, yeah, but whatever. Then I saw the photo you had on your phone when I was messing with your background, and I kept thinking about how you— I— how you looked. I knew you weren’t telling the whole truth, with the slump thing.”

“Oh,” Cody says. “That’s— I’m sorry. I just—”

“I liked how you looked,” Chris mutters. “When I thought about it. And then I kept wondering if you wore them for anyone else. Who got those photos. And why I didn’t know.”

“I can put it on.”

“What?”

Cody looks up at him, unsurety written in the twist of his mouth. “I can put something on. That you bought.”

"Oh." He wants to see Cody in the lingerie, didn't know it was an option. Presented, laid bare, Chris wants to see him wearing it so much. "It’s late, man. Are you— you sure?"

He's normally so confident, both on the field and off, even when he's getting teased. Chris doesn't know what to say, but he wants to reassure Cody, somehow. That it's okay, that he wants it too.

"If you are." Cody hasn't moved very much, but he shifts from one foot to the other. “I didn’t send anyone the photos. They were mine.”

Chris mirrors him. "I'd, uh. Like that." Fuck going to bed on time. “No one else?”

"You’re the first one." Cody looks at him, then looks away. "Don't like, go anywhere."

Chris is pretty sure his feet are rooted to the ground. The first person to see, fuck. Walking down the hall towards his room, Cody glances over his shoulder a few times, like he's trying to make sure Chris won't disappear. Chris waits, and listens, presses his hand against himself, but he can't hear the drawers open and close. He hears when Cody's door opens, and when he walks back, feet padding against the hardwood.

And Chris knows what it looks like, but it's different, knowing Cody is walking back, he put everything on for him, he's trusting him and showing him and letting him see this. Chris is the first person to see this.

"Hey," Cody says, stopping in front of him, and Chris just stares, eyes tracing the long lines of his body. He ditched his shirt. And pants. "Chris?"

Chris swallows, feels the muscles in his throat work.

“No,” Cody says, and the smile on his face is honey-sweet and spreading. “I know I look good.”

“Shut up,” Chris says, his breath all shuddery. “Just shut up.” He sinks down to his knees, tucking his fingers in the thin lace waistband. They’re Dodger blue, he’d picked the color instinctually, almost everything in Cody’s top drawer was blue, whether it’s lack of creativity or — he looks good in it, that's a fact, Chris wants to wipe the stupid smug vain look off Cody’s face. He leans in and mouths over the lace, drags his tongue over the head where it’s pressing wet against its constraints. Cody tastes like salt and cotton, and Chris gets his mouth on as much of him as he can, pressing his thumbs into Cody's hips.

Cody shudders but stays still, and Chris draws back, licks the head of his dick again, keeps it light. He can feel Cody's stomach muscles contracting under his fingertips, and he thinks back to inhabiting Cody's body, the way he seized up all over when he came. It's hard not to like this. Having this effect on someone, having it on Cody.

The waistband is distended now, Cody's dick pushing it out, and Chris takes more of him into his mouth, the lace scratching under his tongue.

“Can you—” Cody's hips twitch. “Dude. Please.”

Chris raises his eyebrows, but he slides the underwear down, hooking it under Cody's dick, lets Cody push past his lips. Starts to move, not teasing anymore, all slow, steady suction. It's messy, he can tell. Wet, spit sliding down Cody’s dick, soaking the fabric. His mouth is stretched wide, and when he looks up Cody is staring down at him.

“Fuck,” Cody says, hips twitching, barely restrained, and Chris drags his hand over Cody's waistband, trailing his fingertips around Cody's hip and the curve of his ass, leaving goosebumps in his wake.

Tensing, Cody jerks, hitting the back of Chris's throat. He gags, swallowing around the length, pulls back and sucks hard on the head for a moment. “Sorry,” Cody says, “sorry, fuck, I'm just—”

“It’s okay,” Chris says. “Whatever you need, whatever, I’m good.” He sinks down again, slow, then falls back into the same rhythm and sooner than not Cody’s clutching at him, coming down his throat, the bitter taste spreading over his tongue. Chris swallows and swallows around him, keeps his thumb hooked in the lace, holding on.

“Oh my god,” Cody says, and then he says it again, softer, pulling Chris up and dragging him in for a kiss, uncaring that Chris tastes like come. Chris grinds against him, Cody’s soft dick trapped in between them, and Cody hisses, so oversensitive. Part of Chris wants to jerk off onto him, come on the underwear, but Cody’s sinking down onto his knees before he can suggest anything and he files it away for later. Cody presses a kiss to his stomach, the jut of his hip, before looking up. “I haven’t—”

“You don’t have to.”

“I really want to, dude.” Cody’s looking at his dick with the same fervor he gives both full-fat ice cream and opposing pitchers, and it’s fucking ridiculous how much that look works for Chris, but it does. Two firsts together, he thinks, and has to take a deep breath.

Cody gets his shorts down, and Chris takes his shirt off and tosses it to the side so they’re on equal footing. He’s standing naked in their living room, Cody’s in lace underwear and kneeling by the couch, and this has been the hottest thing that’s ever happened to him. Cody gets on his knees, shifting his weight until he’s comfortable, then wraps his hand around Chris’s dick and dips his head in.

He goes too far at first, pulls back, and Chris waits until Cody tries again, mouth sliding over the head of his dick, hand covering everything else he can’t take. He can’t go much more down the shaft but it’s okay. Chris was never going to be able to last anyway. He holds himself back from rocking up into Cody’s mouth, looks down at how Cody’s lashes are lowered as he concentrates, how he can see the underwear, the shape of his hips and ass, how delicate he looks from this angle.

The orgasm hits him like a wave, his toes curling. He grabs onto Cody’s shoulder, then the back of Cody’s head once he doesn’t move, as Cody gags and then swallows. He gets off Chris’s dick and one last pulse of come hits the corner of his mouth. Chris watches as he licks it off.

So, he thinks, as Cody untangles himself, as they kiss again. This is what it feels like. It’s not just fondness, and that’s okay.

Cody breaks the kiss and yawns, his jaw cracking. Chris smiles at him. He can’t help it. “Hey,” he says. “Let’s just go to bed.”

“If I wake up in your body I’m gonna kill you,” Cody says, and, like it's the easiest thing he's ever done, follows him down the hall.

-

The sunlight spills in through the blinds, deja vu, waking them both. Cody’s tucked against him, one long arm draped over his waist, their legs tangled together. They’re both in the right bodies. It’s all okay.

Chris wants to kiss him awake. He doesn’t know if he should.

“Cody,” he says, touches his fingertips to Cody’s collar.

Cody jolts, then opens his eyes, settling back into the pillows. “Hi,” he says. His hair’s sticking up and he’s practically cross-eyed. Chris doesn’t care.

“Do you wanna talk now?” he asks. “Or eat. Or both.”

“Both, I think,” Cody says. “Can you make eggs?”

Chris can do that. They head to the kitchen, Cody in his usual borrowed sweatpants that are both too wide on him and make Chris’s chest clench when he thinks about it. He scrambles eggs while Cody pokes at the coffee maker. They don’t have to go to the stadium for a few hours, he’s always liked having this kind of morning, slow and sleepy, the two of them moving around each other in the kitchen with their eyes half-closed, so aware of each other’s space.

They make it most of the way through breakfast before Cody sets his fork down, a flush spreading across his cheeks, underneath his farmer’s tan. “So,” he says.

“So.” Chris swallows. “Last night.”

“I liked the sex part.” Cody gets pinker. “That was good.”

“Yeah.” Chris swallows. “All of it? Not just when we were, you know, switched.”

“No one’s ever done that for me before,” Cody says. “I mean, I guess no one knew, but there wasn’t anyone who I wanted to know either.”

“I want to be able to do things for you,” Chris says. “Get you stuff like that and, you know. I like doing that with you. I want to, if you do too."

“Okay.” Cody’s looking at him and that’s brave, Chris thinks. “I know we’re living with each other, and I don’t want it to be weird or anything, you know?”

“The last few weeks have been so fucking weird,” Chris tells him. “I can’t imagine this is gonna fuck us up more, you know? We made it through waking up in each other’s bodies.”

Cody smiles, slow and genuine, his eyes crinkling up at the corners. “True,” he says. “Good thinking, CT.” His gaze is still level. “I know I was kind of avoiding you, but with everything, I just — didn’t know, and I’m sorry, and — I want to make out right now, honestly, that’s what I want.”

“I shouldn’t have just left the packages on your bed,” Chris says. “But I couldn’t stop thinking about it.” In for a penny, in for a pound, right? “I jerked off while thinking about you in them during the road trip, like, a lot.”

“Definitely make out with me right now,” Cody says, and straight up climbs into his lap, legs wrapping around him. The chair creaks ominously underneath them, not designed to support 400 pounds of baseball player, but Chris doesn’t care. He gets his hands in Cody’s hair and pulls him in.

“I’m glad I’m back,” Cody says, mumbles it against his lips before kissing his jaw. “Chill adventure, I guess, but kissing like this is way better.”

Chris doesn’t respond, kisses him for a long time, until they’re both gasping. He knows the name of the feeling in his chest, even if he can’t yet say it. “How long until we have to leave for the game?” he asks.

Looking down at his phone, Cody shrugs. “Couple hours? I wanted extra BP, gotta make sure my swing is back.”

“Okay,” Chris says. “We can work with that.” He leans in, so his mouth is brushing against Cody’s ear. “And then if we win you can show me everything else in your top drawer.”

Cody looks at him. “You really want to see?”

“I do,” Chris says, and tugs him back in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the alt text is only working right now for one of the images - the plain text is in the next chapter, if you want to read it there!!!
> 
> thank you for making it through this M E S S of a story. i hope it was fun.


	2. the articles

**Jeff Sullivan:** Hello friends 

**Jeff Sullivan:** Welcome to Friday baseball chat 

**Ozzie Ozzie Albies Free:** What do you make of Cody Bellinger and Chris Taylor batting on opposite sides during the game last night?

**Jeff Sullivan:** that's certainly odd, even for a game versus the Padres, since neither is a switch hitter 

**Jeff Sullivan:** Both hit well last night, in part I'm sure due to some very confused pitchers 

**Jeff Sullivan:** Might be a blog post in this 

-

_ "The Dodgers Are Up to Something" _

This past Thursday, the Dodgers played the Padres. This is not an extraordinary event. The Dodgers have played the Padres several times this season and will play the Padres several times more. And seeing as it was a midseason, midweek game, you'd be forgiven for not noticing two small quirks in the lineup. 

Cody Bellinger, who bats left, batted right. Chris Taylor, who bats right, batted left. Neither of them are switch hitters, and neither of them have done this before at the major league level. Bellinger started the game in center, and Taylor in left, which is normal enough. The Dodgers beat the Padres 7-3, which is normal enough. Bellinger hit a home run, which is also normal enough, at least if you’re Cody Bellinger.

I just can’t get over the batting. I don’t watch the Dodgers on a regular basis, and even I know this is weird. 

Both Bellinger and Taylor have been slumping. Bellinger is 0-11 with a walk, and Taylor is 0-12, with his last hit a bloop single. Almost every out has been a strikeout, though Bellinger did manage a long deceptive fly out. Maybe they wanted to try something new. The Dodgers are in a division race, after all, with the Rockies hot on their heels. 

Let’s watch Cody Bellinger strikeout looking. Let’s then watch Chris Taylor strikeout swinging.

Now let’s watch Cody Bellinger take batting practice with the wrong hand. He’s making contact! A positive, if you’re in a slump. There’s no video of Taylor at batting practice, but considering his in-game switch, I’m assuming it went similarly well. 

We all have off days. Or the two of them have somehow switched places. But more likely, it's the Padres, and July, and people get bored. Bellinger and Taylor simply did it more publicly than most.

**Author's Note:**

> the alt text is only working right now for one of the images - the plain text is in the next chapter, if you want to read it there!!!
> 
> thank you for making it through this M E S S of a story. i hope it was fun.


End file.
